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This week, I visited Skyjack, where I learned that the company will be introducing an 80-something foot articulating boom lift, a 5,000-lb. telehandler, and a 12,000-lb. telehandler in the next few months. Although details about the new machines were not yet available, the news that they are coming is exciting.

Rummaging through a drawerful of research information and other interesting tidbits of knowledge I’ve collected, I rediscovered a business card-sized handout from a Joel Barker seminar about paradigms.

A recent newsletter from the Association of Equipment Manufacturers (AEM) noted that the organization is working with manufacturers of aerial work platforms (AWP) to help develop a new safety standard aiming to increase AWP safety in China.

The International Powered Access Federation (IPAF) has issued guidance for exiting platforms at height.

The two-page document starts by saying that mobile elevating work platforms (MEWPs), known more commonly as aerial work platforms (AWPs) here in North America, are designed for people to work from within the platform, but that in some exceptional cases, exiting at height may be permitted.

It goes on to say that a “robust risk assessment” should be conducted to assure that exiting the platform is the safest and most effective means of accessing a particular location.

CSA Group, an accredited standard development organization (SDO), has put out for public comment its new standards for aerial work platforms, or mobile elevating work platforms (MEWPs), as they’re called practically everywhere but here in the United States.

The proposed new B354 standards have a very different format than the previous ones, which guided the Canadian aerial industry for years.

At the 2015 Intermat show in Paris, Cummins announced the results of a Tier 4 engine teardown inspection undertaken to compare Tier 4 and Tier 3 engine durability. According to the engine manufacturer, the disassembly and in-depth examination of a QSL9 Tier 4 low emissions engine (250-400 hp) at close to 10,000 operating hours revealed major components, fuel system, turbocharger and the block to be in near-perfect condition after three years of operation in a heavy lift-and-carry application.

In late March, I attended the International Powered Access Federation’s international summit for the first time. The one-day annual meeting rotates between major cities in different parts of the world, often in Europe. This year, the summit was held in Washington, D.C., only its second time in the United States, so I jumped at the chance to be there.

I'm glad I did. The event packed a lot of information into one day and two evenings.

At the recent regional meeting of the International Powered Access Federation (IPAF), AWP safety expert Gary Riley gave an excellent presentation that questioned whether scissor lift users should tie off to the machine.

Just to be absolutely clear, Riley’s case for not using a harness and lanyard applies only to scissor lifts. In contrast, boom lift users must always tie off because a boom lift can catapult them out of its platform. OSHA regulations, industry best practices, and physics all demand a harness and lanyard be used when operating a boom lift.

For some time now, I’ve been wondering about the potential for using carbon composites in the structural components of access and lifting equipment.

The durable, lighter-weight materials are showing up ever more frequently in structural components for a growing variety of other products, ranging from bicycle frames to high-end cars, bridges, and even aircraft fuselages, so do they have a future in aerial lifts, telehandlers, and cranes?

On the face of it, one might think that they would be lighter than steel, which could allow longer reach or hi

I relish the chance to run equipment, so when I was one of more than 30 editors that JLG invited to experience a day at its newly expanded and improved customer training center in McConnellsburg, Pa., I accepted eagerly.

JLG’s invitation promised a tour of its training center; the chance to run a scissor lift, a boom lift, and a telehandler on the center’s proving ground; and a chance to ride up 185 ft. in the JLG 1850SJ, the world’s tallest self-propelled boom lift.

As I write this column, I am in the midst of evaluating this year’s entries in Lift and Access magazine’s Leadership in Lifting Equipment and Aerial Platforms (LLEAP) awards. Soon, I’ll be compiling the scores from all of the judges, who include fleet managers, fleet owners, and all of the MCM Group’s editors.

If the health of the powered access, lifting, and material-handling industries can be estimated by the number and quality of LLEAP entries, all three segments are hearty.

I’m proud to recently have earned a PAL card, verifying that I’ve been trained to operate scissor and boom lifts safely. I’m not likely to work in an aerial lift often, but I will get the chance to run one in order to evaluate how it operates, position it for an event, or reach a work site while researching an article.

Fatalities caused by falls from elevation continue to be a leading cause of death for construction workers, accounting for 269 of the 775 construction fatalities recorded in 2012. According to Scott Owyen, global training manager for Terex AWP,.those deaths could have been preventable.In honor of OSHA’s National Fall Prevention Stand-Down, June 2 – 6, Terex AWP is providing the following safety tips for operating powered access equipmen to reduce the likelihood of a potential deadly fall.

During 2011 and 2012, two municipal workers were fatally injured while repairing traffic lights: Each was working from the raised bucket of an aerial lift truck and was thrown from the bucket when struck by a passing tractor-trailer.